GB2353920A

GB2353920A - Security key system

Info

Publication number: GB2353920A
Application number: GB0011103A
Authority: GB
Inventors: Chikara Shimamura; Masamitsu Kobayashi
Original assignee: Sensor Technos Co Ltd
Current assignee: Sensor Technos Co Ltd
Priority date: 1999-07-22
Filing date: 2000-05-08
Publication date: 2001-03-07
Anticipated expiration: 2020-05-08
Also published as: DE10035380A1; JP2001034468A; KR20010020651A; FR2796737A1; CA2300544A1; CN1282027A; ITTO20000304A1; IT1320003B1; GB2353920B; ITTO20000304A0; GB0011103D0

Abstract

A security key system adapted to preventing illegal copying of softwares. A CD-ROM is sold with a plurality of LC resonance tags 1 being stuck to a CD case 23 of the CD-ROM as means for generating check digits at the time of installation. Waves reflected by the LC resonance tags are detected by placing the CD case 23 on a reflected wave scanner 11 connected to a personal computer 21. The reflected wave scanner 11 sends check digits corresponding to the waves reflected by the LC resonance tags 1 to the personal computer 21. The installer in the personal computer 21 executes the instillation after having confined the ID key data of the CD-ROM and the check digits. After the instillation, the LC resonance tag 1 on the CD case 23 is peeled off or the sticking position is changed according to the message, and the installer confirms a change in the reflected wave to complete the instillation.

Description

2353920 SECURITY KEY SYSTEM

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION Field of the Invention

The present invention relates to a security key system and, particularly, to a security key system using an LC resonance tag as a security key.

Description of the Prior Art

Software programs recorded in the media such as CDROM, ROM cartridge and floppy disk and placed in the market are accompanied by a problem of illegal deed of copying violating the Copyright Law, and it has been urged to provide a security key system for preventing the deed of illegal copying.

In recent years, further, a system has been put into practice for providing software programs and a variety of data through an on-line network such as internet, and a system has been proposed for offering music programs and video programs through the internet with charge. In such a fee-charging data service system, a security key system becomes necessary which permits only those users who satisfy predetermined conditions to download the data from the data service System from the standpoint of settlement of the charge, etc.

A known security key system of this kind can be represented by the one which uses an IC card or a magnetic card. A person who wishes to utilize a data service system purchases an IC card or a magnetic card issued by the data source, reads and writes the data of the card using a card reader to unlock the security key for a particular content on the on-line network and is thus able to download a desired program.

However, the IC card and the magnetic card require a considerable cost. In the future where it is expected that a strikingly increased number of people may utilize the communication network, therefore, it is desired to provide a security key system of a lower cost. Thus, there arises a technical assignment that must be solved for providing a security key system which can be mass-produced at lower costs - 2 SUIY OF THE INVENTION The object of this invention is to solve the above assignment.

The present invention was proposed in order to accomplish the abovementioned object, and provides a security key system, comprising:

an LC resonance tag constituting an LC resonance circuit by forming an electrically conducting spiral pattern on one surface or on both surfaces of a dielectric film; and a reflected wave scanner which transmits sweeping electromagnetic waves from a frequency sweeping transmitter, compares the waveforms received by a receiver with the transmitted waveforms, and detects the presence of the LC resonance tag in the transmission electric field and the resonance frequency of the LC resonance tag based upon the result of comparison; the reflected wave scanner being connected to a personal computer, and the security of the computer being managed by using, as a security key, the waves reflected by the LC resonance tag and detected by the reflected wave scanner; wherein the LC resonance tag is attached to a package software such as Cd-ROM or ROM cartridge, check digit data are formed in connection with the frequency of the waves reflected by the LC resonance tag detected by the reflected wave scanner or in connection with a frequency spectrum pattern thereof, the ID key data of the package software are collated with the check digit data, and the installation, copying and rewriting of data of the software are permitted or inhibited relying upon the result of collation.

The invention further provides a security key system, wherein check digit data are formed in connection with the frequency of the waves reflected by the LC resonance tag that is delivered or sold or in connection with the frequency spectrum pattern thereof, the ID key data of a particular content on the on-line network are collated with the check digit data, and the access to the content and the downloading of the data are 3 permitted or inhibited relying upon the result of collation.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE DRAWINGS

Fig. 1 is a sectional view of an LC resonance tag; Fig. 2 illustrates the LC resonance tag, wherein Fig. 2(a) is a plan view showing an electrically conducting pattern on the front surface, Fig. 2 (b) is a plan view showing an electrically conducting pattern on the back surf ace, and Fig. 2 (c) is a view illustrating a positional relationship between the electrically conducting patterns on the front and back surfaces; Fig. 3 is a block diagram of a reflected wave scanner circuit; Fig. 4 is a timing chart illustrating the scanning operation of the reflected wave scanner; Fig. 5 is a graph illustrating a waveform pattern drawn by sampling the echo waves of the LC resonance tag; Fig. 6 is a view of a software installation managing system; and Fig. 7 is a view of a fee-charging on-line data delivering system.

DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

An embodiment of the invention will now be described in detail. The security key system of the invention is constituted by a reflected wave scanner connected to a personal computer and an LC resonance tag.

Fig. 1 shows an LC resonance tag I having patterns formed on both surf aces, as an example of the LC resonance tag, which is in the form of a thin sheet formed by adhering metallic electric conductors 4 and 5 on both surfaces of a dielectric film 2 via an adhesive 3. Referring to Figs. 2(a), 2(b) and 2 (c), the conductors 4 and 5 on both surf aces of the LC resonance tag 1 have capacitor patterns 4b and 5b of relatively large areas continuous to the outer ends of rectangular spiral coil patterns 4a and 5a. The inner peripheral ends of the coil patterns 4a and 5a on the front and back surfaces are connected 4 together by a conductor 6 shown in Fig. 1. An LC series resonance circuit is formed by an inductance due to the coil patterns 4a, 5a and by a capacitance due to the capacitor patterns 4b, 5b facing thereto via the dielectric film 2.

The resonance frequency of the LC resonance tag 1 varies depending upon the numbers of turns of the coil patterns 4a, 5a and the areas of the capacitor patterns 4b, 5b, and many kinds of LC resonance tags having different resonance frequencies are prepared and used in a range of a short wave band up to an ultrashort wave band. The conductors 4 and 5 are formed by etching, by printing an electrically conducting paste or by the like means. As the dielectric f ilm 2, there can be used PP (polypropylene), PET (polyethylene terephthalate) or PI (polyimide). As the adhesive 3, there can be preferably used a material having a dielectric constant nearly equal to that of the dielectric film 2.

Fig. 3 illustrates the constitution of circuit blocks of the ref lected wave scanner 11, in which the output of a VCO 13 controlled by a sequence control unit 12 is amplified through a transmission amplifier 14, and is transmitted from a transmission antenna 15. Here, the frequency band that is used is f rom a short wave band through up to an ultrashort wave band, and the scanning of a preset frequency band is repeated at a regular scanning interval.

When the transmitted waves are ref lecte d by an LC resonance tag 1 that resonances with a given frequency in the sweeping frequency band of the reflected wave scanner 11, then, the ref lected waves fall on a reception antenna 16. The received waves are amplified through a reception amplifier 17 and are input to a phase comparator 18 together with the output of the transmission amplifier 14. The output of the phase comparator 18 is sampled by an A/D converter 19 in synchronism with the reference clocks. The received waveform data from which noise is removed and which are binary-coded, are written into a memory in the sequence control unit 12.

Sweeping frequency band data, scan interval data and waveform patternanalyzing program are stored in the memory of the sequence control unit 12. The sequence control unit 12 has a comparing/analyzing function based on a pattern matching method that is widely used in a field of image processing, and collates the reference waveform pattern data with the received waveform pattern data. Based on the result of comparing and analyzing the reflected waves, the sequence control unit 12 sends, to the host computer, the data that are related to the LC resonance tag.

Next, described below is the operation of the reflected wave scanner 11. Here, the transmission frequency band of the reflected wave scanner is divided into ten channels, and ten kinds of LC resonance tags are used having resonance frequencies lying nearly at the centers of the bands of the channels.

The reflected wave scanner successively scans the frequency bands of from CH-1 (channel 1) through up to CH-10 (channel 10) shown in Fig. 4(1). Each channel is constituted, as shown in Fig. MD, by frequency bands of 17 steps (fnOO to fn16 (n = 1, 2, ---, 10)). The frequency is changed stepwise like 5.00 MHz, 5. 01 MHz, 5.02 MHz, 5.03 MHz, --- by controlling the sequence control unit, in order to sweep each channel in 17 steps.

As shown in Fig. 4(5), further, every frequency fn(i) of 17 steps is transmitted for a predetermined period of time T2 (several microseconds). In order to cope with noise, every frequency fn(i) is intermittently and repetitively transmitted a plurality of times maintaining a repeating timing T1 (several tens of microseconds) and, then, a frequency fn (i+l) of the next step is transmitted.

Fig. 4(5) illustrates the timing of a transmission output gate, wherein A represents the waveform of electromagnetic waves transmitted from the transmission antenna, and B represents the waveform input to the reception antenna when the LC resonance tag does not exist in the sensitive region of the reception antenna.

On the other hand, when the LC resonance tag that resonates with the frequency of the transmitted electromagnetic 6 waves exists in the sensitive region of the antenna, echo waves of the LC resonance tag are superposed on the electromagnetic waves directly arriving at the reception antenna from the transmission antenna thereby to form a waveform as represented by C.

In a section P1 (transmission time), in this case, the phase differs between B and C with respect to the transmission waveform denoted by A (A - B A - C). In C, further, echo waves delayed by the LC resonance tag are recognized in a section P2 that follows the section Pl.

A pattern of resonance levels shown in Fig. 5 is obtained if the reception level of the delayed portion (P2) of the echo wave only at the same frequency transmitted a plural number of times maintaining a predetermined timing is accumulated and if the reception levels of echo waves at respective frequencies (fnO to fn16) in each channel are subjected to the A/D conversion and are sampled.

The reflected wave scanner repeats the transmission of the same frequency fn(i) to remove white noise and impulsive noise, and specifies the frequency channel of the LC resonance tag when a phase dif f erence of C from B is recognized in the section P1 like in C, and when a resonance level pattern in the section P2 satisfies the sharpness of resonance based on dl and d2 in Fig. 5 and satisfies a predetermined value.in an error allowable range for the design frequency denoted by d3. Then, the reflected wave scanner sends the data related to the LC resonance tag to the host computer.

in the case of a system in which the kinds of the LC resonance tags are ten as described above, and one kind of the LC resonance tag among the LC resonance tags of 10 kinds is stuck to an object, the number of kinds that can be identified is ten. In the case of a system in which f ive kinds of the LC resonance tags among ten channels of the LC resonance tags are stuck in combination to the object, the number of kinds that can be identified is 10C5 = 252 according to the formula of combination of permutations. When any six channels among 42 7 channels are combined, the number of kinds that can be identified is 42C6 '-" 5,245,786. By increasing the transmission/reception channels and the frequency channels of the LC resonance tags as r equ ired, the number of kinds that can be identified can be increased nearly infinitely.

Next, described below is a software installation managing system based on the above-mentioned security key system. Referring to Fig. 6, the reflected wave scanner 11 is connected to a universal system bus (USB) of a personal computer 21 through a USB cable 22, and is controlled by an OS of the personal computer 21. The personal computer 21 sends a security data control signal to the reflected wave scanner 11 which, then, sends check digit data based on the waves reflected by the LC resonance tag to the personal computer 21. A plurality of LC resonance tags 1 are attached to a CD case 23 of the CD-ROM which is a package software to place it on the market, the LC resonance tags 1 being used as means for generating check digits for compensating the serial ID key data of the CD-ROM.

When the CD case 23 is placed on the reflected wave scanner 11 at the time of installing the software, the reflected wave scanner 11 detects the waves reflected by the LC resonance tags 1 as described above, and check digits corresponding to the reflected waves are sent to the personal computer 21.

The means for forming check digits may find the cheek digits from the resonance frequency of the LC resonance tags or from the reflected wave pattern data thereof according to a check digitcalculation formula like a bar-code system, or may form the check digits by making a reference to a check digit data table, or may find the check digits based on the combination thereof without any particular limitation.

The installer of OS of the personal computer 21 executes the installation of the software upon confirming the ID key data of the CD-ROM and the cheek digits produced by the reflected wave scanner.

After the installation has been finished, the installer of the OS peels an LC resonance tag 1 of f the CD case 23 or displays a message instructing a change in the position 8 for sticking the LC resonance tag 1. As the user peels the LC resonance tag 1 off according to the instruction, the reflected wave scanner 11 detects the reflected waves of a changed pattern. The installation is completed when it is confirmed that the output data are those as instructed. When the LC resonance tag is to be peeled off, further, the LC resonance tag may be formed integrally with a postcard for registering the user, to prevent the deed of illegal copying without mistake.

For version-up of the software, an LC resonance tag for version-up is delivered. If the LC resonance tag is stuck to a predetermined position of the CD case 23 and is placed on the reflected wave scanner 11, check digits for the version-up are read out through the reflected wave scanner 11 to accomplish the version-up processing. In the case of the on-line versionup, the peeling of LC resonance tag I or a change in the sticking position is instructed on-line, and the version-up processing is executed when the output data of the reflected wave scanner 11 have changed as instructed.

Fig. 7 illustrates an on-line sales system of feecharging program delivery media such as music and movies, and where a ticket 24 containing the LC resonance tag 1 that serves as a security key is sold, or the ticket 24 is sold being attached to a magazine or a book. Charge for purchasing the music data can be included in the price of the ticket or in the price of the magazine. Or, the charge can be settled on-line from the user's account when the data are downloaded.

When the ticket 24 is set to the reflected wave scanner 11, check digits obtained from the LC resonance tag 1 of the ticket 24 serve as a key for unsealing the content of the fee-charging program delivery media on the internet. Then, the management data such as electronic watermark data included in the desired music program data are collated with the check digits of the LC resonance tag 1. When the result of collation is OK, a predetermined LC resonance tag is peeled of f according to the instruction f rom the ticket 24 on which a plurality of LC resonance tags 1 have been stuck. After it is confirmed by the ref lected wave scanner 11 that the LC resonance tag has been 9 peeled off, music data are downloaded onto the personal computer and are written into a solid memory-type reproducing unit 25 exclusively for the delivered media. A thin LC resonance tag deforms after it is once peeled off. Even when adhered to the ticket again, therefore, the frequency characteristics undergo a change. Therefore, the LC resonance tag loses the function of the security key and hence cannot be reused.

Further,, the reflected wave scanner 11 may be provided with a ticket insertion port,, the interior of the ticket insertion port may be provided with means for destroying the LC resonance tag by a laser beam or punching or may be provided with means for changing the resonance frequency so that,, in the case of a ticket which is valid only one time, the LC resonance tag of the ticket is destroyed so that the ticket can be no longer used after having confirmed the check digits of the ticket inserted in the ticket insertion port and, in the case of a ticket which is valid for a plurality of times, one LC resonance tag is destroyed among the plurality of LC resonance tags to change the resonance frequency, thereby to confirm the number of usable times by the reflected waves and to manage the number of times the ticket can be used.

It need. not be pointed out that the security key system of the invention can be applied as a system for preventing the deed of copying a computer game software and can be applied as a security key system for a prepaid system such as a fee-charging reading system of the internet. Further, the invention is in no way limited to the above-mentioned embodiments only but can be modified in a variety of ways within the technical scope of the invention. It should therefore be noted that the invention encompasses even those modified embodiments, as a matter of course.

As described above, the security key system of the invention uses the LC resonance tag as a security key, and is less expensive than such security keys as IC card and magnetic card, and is little affected by the external environment and, hence, stable operation can be expected. Further, it is very difficult to copy the LC resonance tag itself, and great effect is exhibited in preventing the deed of illegally copying software and in maintaining security for the on-line communications.

11

Claims

CLAIMS:

1. A security key system, comprising: an LC resonance tag constituting an LC resonance circuit by forming an electrically conducting spiral pattern on one surface or on both surfaces of a dielectric film; and a reflected wave scanner which transmits sweeping electromagnetic waves from a frequency sweeping transmitter, compares the waveforms received by a receiver with the transmitted waveforms, and detects the presence of the LC resonance tag in the transmission electric field and the resonance frequency of the LC resonance tag based upon the result of comparison; the reflected wave scanner being connected to a personal computer, and the security of the computer being managed by using, as a security key, the waves reflected by the LC resonance tag and detected by the reflected wave scanner; wherein the LC resonance tag is attached to a package software such as Cd-ROM or ROM cartridge, check digit data are formed in connection with the frequency of the waves reflected by the LC resonance tag detected by the reflected wave scanner or in connection with a frequency spectrum pattern thereof, the ID key data of the package software are collated with the cheek digit data, and the installation, copying and rewriting of data of the software are permitted or inhibited relying upon the result of collation.

2. A security key system, comprising: an LC resonance tag constituting an LC resonance circuit by forming an electrically conducting spiral pattern on one surface or on both surfaces of a dielectric film; and a reflected wave scanner which transmits sweeping electromagnetic waves from a frequency sweeping transmitter, compares the waveforms received by a receiver with the transmitted waveforms, and detects the presence of the LC resonance tag in the transmission electric field and the 12 resonance frequency of the LC resonance tag based upon the result of comparison; the reflected wave scanner being connected to a personal computer, and the security of the computer being managed by using, as a security key, the waves reflected by the LC resonance tag and detected by the reflected wave scanner; wherein, check digit data are formed in connection with the frequency of the waves reflected by the LC resonance tag that is delivered or sold or in connection with the frequency spectrum pattern -thereof, the ID key data of a particular content on the on-line network are collated with the check digit data, and the access to the content and the downloading of the data are permitted or inhibited relying upon the result of collation.